Six local groups are each receiving $50,000 grants – the first set of grants made by the Early Care and Education Funders Collaborative.

Launched last October by The Women’s Foundation, the Collaborative is a multi-year, multi-million dollar partnership between foundations and corporations to improve early care and education programs by investing in partners focused on strategic advocacy and industry building efforts.

The six organizations receiving the first grants are:

DC Appleseed, to increase the wages of child care workers in the District;

CentroNía, to increase the number of bilingual trainers and advisers in Maryland who can help entry-level teachers get their Child Development Associate (CDA) credential;

Empower DC, to define a policy agenda and train grassroots leaders to serve as advocates to ensure early care and education is a priority for District leaders;

Fairfax Futures, to expand school readiness partnerships in the county so child care professionals can prepare low-income children to start kindergarten ready to learn and succeed;

Hopkins House, to help low-income women in northern Virginia earn their CDA credential and partner with Northern Virginia Community College to ensure their CDA credits can be applied toward an associate’s degree in early childhood education; and,

Voices for Virginia’s Children, to advocate on behalf of young children, families and child care programs to expand the Commonwealth’s quality rating systems to more Northern Virginia child care programs.

Current members of the Collaborative include PNC Bank, the Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation, The Boeing Co, W.K. Kellogg Foundation, CityBridge Foundation, Freddie Mac Foundation, Meyer Foundation and Rocksprings Foundation.

Washington Area Women's Foundation mobilizes our community to ensure that economically
vulnerable women and girls in the Washington region have the resources they need to thrive. Since
1998, the Women's Foundation has worked to transform the lives of women and girls in the Washington
region and the world.